Pond Boss Forums AQUATIC VEGETATION Controlling unwanted plants Watermeal treatment questions

I have a watermeal problem on my 1.1 acre pond. I'm not certain the age of the pond but I know it's at least 15 years old. I started (slowly) to aerate it 10 days ago. I'm up to 2 hours a night. I'm planning on going to 4 hours in the next couple days. When calm the watermeal covers the entire pond. My order of alligare (whitecap replacement) is due to arrive any day now.

Here are my questions:
1) Would it be best to go ahead and treat the pond now or wait until the weather cools off a bit (seems like I saw something about avoid treating when the watermeal is thick)?

2) I have a layer of Chara around the perimeter of the pond (out from the shore 10 - 15 ft), can I add the alligare to the water just on the outside of that or should I navigate through that mess and apply it?

3) I assume running an aerator at night is ok after applying this stuff to the pond? Is that a correct statement?

4) I also seem to remember someone saying that applying a dye after treatment is a good idea. Is this true or did I just dream that?

This is year 2 of having a watermeal issue. I didn't know what to do last year and research has led me here. Any additional suggestions are certainly welcome. Thanks.

MK70, sorry to hear about your watermeal issue. I had one in my half acre pond and seem to now be ahead of it after two years of treatment.

The WM will certainly begin to die once we get cold nights coming back around. If you don't want to wait, treat it. However, treating at the stage it sounds you are at means it's going to be awhile before you see any results. That's what I did the fist year of treatment and it wasn't really until at least a couple of months later that I saw the impact. Bottom line is I think you'll get minimal benefit this year, but it certainly won't hurt.

Next year, treat around the time you saw this year's emergence. You don't want to go too early as you'll risk losing the required concentration due to spring rains, snow melt, etc. filling your pond to over capacity and running out. Once the level is stable, hit it. I did that last year and never had a speck of WM show up. This year, I braved it and decided not to treat and we still have not had any WM show up.

Aeration will certainly help as it will ensure the fluoridone is pretty well spread throughout the entire water column. If I had aeration, I'd probably add the fluoridone right around the boil(s) to let it begin spreading from the source of the water agitation.

I don't think running the aeration will hurt the impact of the product in any way, but we have some plant experts here who can probably best answer that question. I'm not one of them!

As for dye, I have not used any and have not had a problems. I've read of others who use it and also have no problems. It may just be a preference. Sunlight may break down the chemical and dye may slow that process, so your particular circumstances and preferences will probably dictate what approach you take.

BTW, my pond was totally covered that first year when I applied the Whitecap. On days with a breeze, it would all bunch up in one area, but on calm days it was nearly 100% cover. I did see success, but again, it took awhile. Treating this year may be key to killing the plants that are now emerged as opposed to letting them die off and reseed after they sink. Again, a real plant expert would be more knowledgeable on that, but it seems that if you hit it now you'll kill a lot of the potential for reseeding and then hitting it again next year may allow you to best it as I was able to do.

Bottom line is that WM is nasty stuff and you want to go after it as effectively as you can. Use all the tools available to you and you should succeed.

Good luck!

Just remembered this other thread you should look at - may be just the solution you need for this year followed by a fluoridone treatment next year ahead of the emergence.

Thanks for the info Todd. I'm now leaning toward just waiting until the spring/early summer to treat it. Hopefully alligare doesn't go bad being on the shelf for a few months. I'm also planning on using granular cutrine simultaneously with the alligare. Hoping next year my pond looks less like a putting green & more like water.

Good luck with it and keep us posted. Putting green. . . that's funny, I don't care you are!